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Kinn is sipping coffee in the morning sunlight and leafing through some budget reports from the clubs. Takings are down for this month; he’s going to have to look into it, with some prejudice. That means a round of meetings, which are going to be hell to fit in. He picks up his laptop to consider his diary, then looks up at the shuffle of footsteps.
One of the maids, presumably the one who comes in discreetly each morning to sort out his bedroom, is standing there, looking at him.
Kinn gives her a polite nod of thanks, assuming she’s making her way out. Though—wait—why is she in his living room, disturbing him? All the household staff are vetted and under contract: he scans her for weapons anyway. Less than five seconds, to reach his gun and shoot her; she’s not doing anything overtly suspicious, but she’s here, staring at him, which…
“Mr Kinn, sir?” she says, twisting her apron in her hands.
Kinn starts to frown. He’s trying to fucking work here, what is this?
“Porsche is a good boy,” she says in a rush. “Please, ah, treat him well.” Her tone is…pleading?
Kinn stares at her, completely thrown. Porsche? What the fuck? It’s as though a mouse has popped up and started chatting to him, he can’t quite comprehend the sheer gall of this maid coming in and, what, thinking she can talk to him about his...
“Sorry,” she says, sensibly backing away from whatever expression Kinn feels on his face. “I have to—” She turns and flees.
“Wait, you—” Kinn starts, getting up and striding after her. But by the time he gets through his pristine bedroom and wrenches open the door to his quarters, she’s not visible anywhere. Big and Ken are outside, they both straighten at the sight of him, hands going to their weapons.
“Did you see that maid?” Kinn demands.
The bodyguards exchange a confused glance. “The maid who just left, sir?” Ken says. “She went to the staff elevator. Is there a problem?”
Kinn opens his mouth to order one of them to fetch her back for interrogation, and then reconsiders. “Where’s Porsche?” he asks instead. Like so many things, this interruption to his routine feels as though it’s probably Porsche’s fault.
“Ah, on break?” Ken says. “At breakfast, I expect.”
“Get him back,” Kinn says, and goes back to his papers, only now his concentration is shot and he’s lost track of where he was in the figures.
Porsche arrives, without knocking, about ten minutes later. He’s in full uniform, but slightly dishevelled, as though he’d hurried to get here. Kinn glares at him, which has the effect of making Porsche’s expression turn shifty and calculating for a moment, as though he’s running through all the likely things he’s done to piss Kinn off.
“What’s up?” he says. “I’m not on till nine. I was only gone for, like, twenty minutes.”
“Forty,” Kinn says automatically, and then regrets it when Porsche’s mouth curls up.
“One of the maids spoke to me,” Kinn says, watching to see if Porsche reacts. He doesn’t. “She said…she strongly implied I wasn’t treating you well enough.” He lets this sound accusing.
Porsche’s face splits into a wide grin, and he snorts with amusement. He perches on the edge of the sofa, looking intensely pleased with himself.
“Which maid was it? Was it Ama? Or was Fern on today? Or Jewel—no, she’s not on this floor right now.”
Kinn blinks at him. “I have no idea. I’m more interested in why the fuck the maid thinks I’m…”
“Abusing me?” Porsche suggests, grinning.
Kinn scowls. “This is not fucking funny, Porsche.”
“Ah, come on, Kinn, of course it’s funny!” Porsche snorts again. “Probably wasn’t Ama, she’s terrified of you, she’d never dare—”
“Porsche,” Kinn says, teeth gritted.
Porsche spreads his hands. “This is not my fault! You’re the one that was trying to fuck me through the mattress when I had a leg wound, it’s not on me that the bandage came off!”
“You said you were fine!” Kinn says, derailed. He can’t help glancing at Porsche’s thigh, where the edge of a knife had caught him in last week’s fight.
“I was fine!” Porsche thumps his leg for emphasis. “But you know we got blood all over the sheets, remember? Along with, you know.” He gives Kinn a mischievous look. “You told me to dump them outside the door. And then my suit had got all over blood too, so I had to go make nice with the laundry staff to put it with the overnight dry-cleaning stuff, and I guess when I went down there I was kind of, uh…” His expression gets even more mischievous. “Limping, probably. What with everything.”
Kinn blinks. About half of what Porsche just said means nothing to him, but he does remember that night. Seeing Porsche injured makes him feel a level of desperate want that he finds alarming, though Porsche tends to respond with blazing enthusiasm.
“Look, don’t worry about it,” Porsche carries on. “It’s all gossip, you know what the house staff are like. I’ll talk to them, sort it out.”
“You’ll talk to the staff about...” Kinn waves a hand between them. “About this?”
Porsche looks briefly guilty, and then smooths it out. “Not about anything that matters. I’ll just tell them everything’s fine. And I’d better find whoever it was and tell them you aren’t going to murder them.”
Kinn raises an eyebrow.
“And that you aren’t going to do anything to anyone.” Porsche leans forward and fixes Kinn with a hard stare. “Because you appreciate people looking out for me, right?”
Kinn purses his lips. “Fine,” he says.
He can’t quite stop thinking about it, though. About Porsche, talking to all these people who Kinn doesn’t know, being seen by them: it makes him…uneasy, somehow. Which is why, the next time he sends Porsche down to the kitchen to fetch him a cappuccino and breakfast, he follows after him, a couple of minutes later.
“I’m going down to the kitchens,” he says to Big, whose eyes widen in astonishment. He’s too well-trained to ask anything, though, he simply falls into step behind Kinn. Kinn turns left instead of right, and finds the service elevator. He’s not sure he’s ever been in it. The walls are dingy metal, it smells of disinfectant, and none of the buttons are labelled.
Big coughs politely. “If you’ll excuse me, sir.” He presses one of the lower buttons, and the elevator creaks in protest and starts to descend.
Fortunately, Kinn more or less recognizes where they are when the doors slide open, so he’s able to stride with more confidence through the swinging doors and into the kitchen. He used to sneak down here sometimes with his brothers, when he was little, to try to wheedle treats out of the head cook, what had his name been?
Then their father found out and gave them all a stern lecture, and since then Kinn only found himself in the catering areas when he needed to give the staff a pep talk before a key event, or when some idiot had set something on fire.
It’s busy, because the family, the bodyguards and the household staff all need to be fed; there are about fifteen or so people bustling about. The kitchen is hot, loud, and has obnoxious pop music blasting from somewhere. He spots Porsche easily, he’s at one of their new espresso machines, calling something over his shoulder to a young man in chef’s whites, and grinning.
The people near the door gradually notice Kinn and Big, as they walk in, and a wave of murmurs of deferential greeting followed by silence ripples out from them, as Kinn heads for Porsche. Kinn’s used to it. Someone switches the music off.
“Porsche,” Kinn says.
Porsche looks over his shoulder, and then promptly spills steamed milk everywhere. “Ah, shit, fuck!” he says. “Kinn! Uhh, Big. There’s an emergency?” He’s wincing and rubbing his left hand.
“No,” Kinn says. He sees Porsche and Big exchanging some kind of look, and frowns. “You’ve hurt yourself, let me see.”
“It’s nothing, it’s—ow, stop it.” Kinn grabs Porsche’s wrist—someone behind him makes a hissing sound—and inspects his hand. The skin is reddened. He pulls Porsche over to the nearest sink and sticks his hand under the cold tap.
“I’m fine!” Porsche is saying, overly loudly. “You startled me, I’ll clean that milk up—”
“I’ve got it, Mr Kinn,” says the young man Porsche was talking to. The not unattractive young man. Kinn gives him an icy stare and he takes a step back, holding a cloth defensively in front of him. Everyone else in the kitchen is busily doing whatever they’re supposed to be doing, heads down; Kinn can sense them all listening in.
“Don’t worry, Art,” Porsche says to this guy. “You finish off your breakfast orders, it’s my mess.”
“Yes, Art.” Kinn smiles at him and he quails further. “Get back to work.”
The young man turns back to the counter, where he’s rolling out pastry for something. A woman working at the same counter reaches out and pats his hand, sympathetically. Kinn narrows his eyes.
“Hey,” Porsche says. “Can I get your breakfast now, like you asked me to?”
Kinn turns his attention back to Porsche’s hand, which he’s still gripping. He doesn’t think it’s a serious scald. He turns the tap off, and releases him. Porsche shakes his hand, making a face.
“I only got here like five minutes ago,” he says, aggrieved. “I’m not running late. They’re doing your waffles now.” He waves, presumably towards whatever equipment one uses to make waffles.
“That’s not why—” Kinn says, and then stops. Why is he here?
“I’m changing my breakfast order,” he says. “I want…sticky rice.”
Porsche’s expression is simultaneously confused and suspicious, which is fair, since Kinn never eats rice for breakfast, and also only has to pick up a phone to tell the kitchen to bring whatever he desires.
“Fine,” he says. “Hey, Ploy!” He waves. A middle-aged woman across the kitchen looks up. “Khun Kinn wants your special rice with his breakfast today, OK? Ploy makes the best in Bangkok, I’ve been telling you to try it.” He nudges Kinn with his shoulder.
The woman smiles shyly at Porsche, and gives him a thumbs up. “And maybe a little extra for me?” Porsche smiles back at her, making hopeful eyes.
He’s beautiful: relaxed, charming, in his element. Kinn can’t bear it, all of a sudden.
“You’re on duty,” he says. “I have things for you to do.” He hears how harsh it sounds, and forces his expression to stay neutral.
“Fine. Khun Kinn,” Porsche says, the eye-roll only audible to Kinn. “I’d better hurry then, mmm?” He goes to step round Kinn to get back to the espresso machine, and Kinn reaches out to grip his shoulder, in passing. Porsche stops, meeting his eyes. The heat in his gaze, along with something that looks like amusement, is hopefully not visible to anyone else.
Kinn doesn’t know what he was planning to do next. He swallows. “Be quick. That’s an order.”
Porsche purses his lips: definitely amused. “Of course, sir,” he says, in a carrying tone. “Whatever you need, sir.”
Kinn would like to kiss him and see if he can wipe that amusement off his face, but they are very much in public. He makes himself release Porsche, and then turns on his heel and stalks out of the kitchen, not acknowledging the renewed muttering behind him.
Well. That went remarkably badly. He makes a mental note to get that guy, Art, moved to work somewhere where Porsche will never see him again, and heads for the more familiar lift.
“If you were trying to get everyone to think that you don’t boss me around and beat me up when you feel like it—” Porsche says to him later, stretched out naked and unashamed across his bed.
“I wanted rice,” Kinn says. The rice had been delicious: he’s added the fact that he didn’t know this to his growing list of irritations.
“Did you now,” Porsche says, arching an eyebrow at him.
Kinn tugs him closer and kisses him, which shuts him up, briefly.
“You know I don’t care if the entire household thinks I’m your sex slave or whatever,” Porsche murmurs, breaking off. “I think it’s funny. There they all are imagining you breaking out the whips and chains and whatever, when really, when we’re on our own, you’re so…”
Kinn kisses him again, and then applies himself to making sure that Porsche can’t think of anything else foolish to say, for quite some time.
After that debacle, Kinn enlists Pete’s help.
“I want to know when Porsche is, ah. Associating with the household staff,” he tells him.
Pete is doing a poor job of masking his confusion. “The household staff?” His eyes widen. “Is there a problem, Khun Kinn? You think one of them might be working for other parties?”
Damn it, Kinn hadn’t thought of that, and it’s a much better rationale than him wanting to spy on his boyfriend for reasons he isn’t quite clear about.
“It’s possible,” he says, gravely. “I’m covering all bases. Message me to let me know.”
“Of course,” Pete says, glowing with responsibility. “I will do.”
Kinn regrets this decision fairly rapidly, since it turns out that in what Kinn thought was the very limited spare time Porsche spends without him, Porsche is doing nothing but associate with the household staff. If he’s not smoking with the chambermaids on the staff terrace, he’s chatting in the kitchen; if he isn’t in the laundry gossiping with someone Pete describes as “the old guy who does all the ironing”, he’s out loitering in the bin area, exchanging bawdy jokes with the garbage collectors. Sometimes he’s sweet-talking the gardeners and the woman who does the household flowers: Kinn starts noticing that jasmine, one of his favourite scents, is appearing nearly every day in the flower arrangements. He hadn’t really noticed that there were flower arrangements, previously.
According to Pete, Porsche knows the names of the emergency plumber, and the seamstress who adjusts Kinn’s suits so that a gun fits snugly beneath them, and the kid who mans the dishwasher. And, worse, they know him.
Things only reach a head, though, when Pete messages him to let him know that Porsche, who has the evening off, has gone off to some kind of party or meeting with the staff, in their canteen. Which Kinn would be absolutely fine with, except that Porsche told him that he was going to watch a film with Pete and have an early night.
The thought of Porsche lying to him makes something hollow out in his chest. He trusts him, he knows that Porsche would never be…unfaithful, just for instance. If he had promised fidelity, which neither of them have. There are a lot of people in the household staff, and Kinn finds it hard to believe anyone could spend time with Porsche and not want him: if Porsche has lied to Kinn, did he lie to Pete, too?
Kinn pulls up a map of the building, so that he can assure himself that he knows where the staff canteen is, and then sets out. Ken’s on duty tonight, he gestures to him to remain in place. His gun is on him, and besides, he’s in his own home. Every single staff member has been extensively checked out, and they all know what would happen to them if they betrayed the family. Or upset one of its leaders.
When he approaches the canteen, he can hear voices, talking. A number of voices: some of the tension he’s been feeling dissipates. But he’s not sure what exactly is going on—it doesn’t sound like a party, so what is it?
He opens the door unceremoniously, and walks in. There are people sitting on tables and on the benches, a large crowd of people, of all sexes and ages, some of whom look vaguely familiar. There’s cigarette smoke in the air, which is strictly forbidden, and some people have bottles of beer. Porsche is one of them, he’s sitting on a table, among the others, in his casual clothes. There’s an older man who was talking as Kinn comes in, with others interjecting; he abruptly stops.
All the faces in the room turn to Kinn, with expressions of dismay and fear. “Shit,” he hears more than one person saying; several are scrambling to exit quietly by the back door. This seems more than is warranted by the fact that this lot have disabled the smoke alarm and are having a…some kind of gathering.
“What’s going on?” Kinn says, folding his arms. He looks at Porsche. A number of other people are looking at Porsche, too.
“We’re having a meeting,” Porsche says, waving an arm around, airily, and giving Kinn his most innocent smile. “Discussing politics, current affairs, that kind of stuff.”
As far as Kinn is aware, Porsche couldn’t name a single politician. He allows himself to look disbelieving.
“You’re looking for me?” Porsche slides off the table. “Let’s go, then.” He walks over confidently, and takes Kinn’s arm. Kinn has the strong sense that the room is holding its collective breath. His skin prickles, though not necessarily in a way that would signal danger.
“Is this true?” Kinn says to the room at large.
“Yes, Khun Kinn,” says the older man. Possibly Kinn saw him in the kitchen? “We’re all off duty. We’re having a…social meeting.”
Kinn flicks his gaze to the ashtrays, and to the beer bottles. “I see. You will ensure that no rules are broken, at this…meeting. I shall send someone down to check and report back, in—” he checks his watch “—fifteen minutes.” He surveys the people there, slowly and deliberately. He’s not bothering to memorize their faces, but they don’t know that.
“Come on, Kinn,” Porsche says to him. “Sorry, guys,” he says to the rest of the room, with an undercurrent in his voice that Kinn can’t read, and that he doesn’t like at all.
They return to Kinn’s rooms in silence. Porsche’s face is set in the way that means he’s unhappy about something.
Kinn pours himself a large brandy, neat. He’s out of ice. Probably because whoever is supposed to restock his ice is at a fucking secret meeting in his building.
He takes a large swig, and arranges himself on the sofa in a pseudo-casual pose. “You lied to me,” he says to Porsche, who is standing and watching him.
Porsche sighs. “Yes. I’m sorry.” He frowns at Kinn. “Wait, how did you even know? Is Pete spying on me again?”
Kinn shrugs. “Pete is following my orders, yes.”
Porsche’s mouth goes tight. “For fuck’s sake, Kinn. You could’ve asked me about whatever it is you want to know. All this time, and you still—”
Kinn leans forward. “What’s going on, Porsche?”
Porsche rubs his mouth with his hand, indecisive. Kinn waits, trying to keep his breathing steady.
Porsche meets his eyes. “Swear to me you won’t tell your father.”
Kinn takes a large drink. It tastes of nothing. “If it affects the family’s safety, you know I can’t do that.”
“No, nothing like that! You think I’d jeopardize your safety?” There’s hurt in Porsche’s voice, now. “It’s—fuck, Kinn, this isn’t my secret, OK?”
“So there is a secret.”
Porsche tips his head back, and blows out a breath. “If I don’t tell you, you’re going to bully someone else, aren’t you. So fine. The household staff think they’re being underpaid, for the shifts they do, and they’re unhappy about, ah, some other things too. Game—ah, someone called a meeting to have a conversation about it.”
“Oh, a conversation?” Kinn says. “What, you’re forming a, a fucking union now?”
“Did you know you only need ten workers to form a union?” Porsche says.
“They’re working for the mafia.” Kinn sets down his glass with a clunk. “This is not the fucking communist party headquarters. I’m going to have everyone at that meeting fired and replaced by the weekend.”
“Oh, fuck you, Kinn.” Porsche sounds genuinely upset, in a way Kinn hasn’t heard in some time. “These are real people with real problems too, you know, and your fucking family hasn’t given them a pay raise in five years, you don’t even give them sick pay—your dad let Bird go just because she took two weeks off when her kid was ill, and she worked for you for decades—”
Kinn forces himself to look nonchalant. “If they don’t like it, they can leave.”
He sees Porsche’s fists clench, and for a moment he thinks Porsche is going to come over, haul him up and punch him: good, he’s starting to feel like a fight.
“I worked as a dishwasher in a hotel kitchen,” Porsche says, his voice tight, “from when I was fourteen, until I was old enough to get behind a bar. The caretaker at my high school had a back problem, couldn’t afford to retire: he paid me in cash to mop the floors for him, empty the bins. You have no idea how much you can hear, when everyone thinks you’re not worth noticing.” He rakes a hand through his hair, his eyes glittering with something.
“Did you know your dad lets Chan have charge of the household staff? Miss Chen, she’s the head housekeeper, she’s a bully, but Chan’s screwing her, so none of the maids dare to complain. Two of our maids came over from Vegas and his lot, and now they’re talking about going back, you want Vegas to ask them about the shit they’ve seen here? You lot are always talking about your people: you don’t give a fuck about most of your people, you don’t even know they’re there—”
“Are you finished?” Kinn interjects.
Porsche’s throat works. His mouth twists. “No,” he says. “But you know what? Fuck this.” He turns round and walks out.
Kinn throws the glass after him, if not quite at him. Porsche doesn’t flinch, or look back, as it bounces off the thick carpet. The door slams behind him.
Kinn is…furious, he’s so angry his hands are shaking: how dare Porsche, who is after all only a bodyguard, try to lecture him, the heir, on how to treat the people who work for him? Those people are lucky to be here, he bets they earn way more than they would in normal jobs. He’s well within his rights to have them punished, or fired, for whatever insubordination they’re plotting; he should be punishing Porsche, too, since he’s clearly one of them…
Porsche had looked at him as though he despised him, as though Kinn was on the other side of an enormous chasm, and Porsche wasn’t even going to try to cross it, because he knew he wouldn’t make it. Recalling his expression is like being punched in the chest. The pain is so acute that Kinn actually presses a fist to his heart.
He puts his head in his hands. When he was fourteen he was working, too: it’s not as though he’d been one of those playboy rich kids he saw round town, money to burn and nothing to do but spend it. But he’d already got used to everything and everyone making way for that work, to the smoothness with which things arranged themselves around him, without him having to think about it.
Porsche is—the thought of Porsche leaving him is like claws digging beneath his carefully arranged armour, scraping at the soft parts he’s tried to hide. He would give Porsche whatever he asked for, in a heartbeat; few things were better than seeing Porsche’s face light up at a gift.
It just hadn’t ever occurred to him that Porsche might want something like this. Though on reflection, perhaps it should have.
If he goes to find Porsche right now, even if he intends to apologize, he’ll say something stupid, and they’ll start fighting again. Or more likely, fucking, but it won’t mean that they’re OK.
He calls Big instead. “We have a staff member called Game,” he says. “Might be one of the chefs. I need a meeting with him immediately. Bring him here.” He hesitates a moment, seeing Porsche’s face again. “Don’t—tell him I’m inviting him for a conversation. Be respectful.”
Big’s “Yes, sir,” manages to sound somehow disapproving, but he’ll do what he’s told. Kinn stands up, picks the glass off the floor, considers the stain it left, and sighs.
By the time he goes to find Porsche, it’s late. The bodyguards’ quarters are quiet. When he knocks on the door, Pete opens it, in his night clothes. He freezes when he sees Kinn, then glances over his shoulder, then looks back at Kinn with a deer in headlights expression.
“Khun Kinn!” he says loudly, and then, quieter, “I’ll, uh, go hang out in the gym for a bit?”
“Mmm.” Kinn lets him slip past, and then steps into the room. Porsche is curled up on his bed, with his back to him, headphones on. Every bit of him is radiating tension. Kinn sighs, watching him, feeling relief unfurl within him just at the fact that they’re in a room together.
He goes and sits on the bed, and strokes a hand up Porsche’s back, caressing the back of his neck. Porsche presses back into it, very slightly. Kinn slips the headphones off.
“I talked to Game,” he says.
Porsche twists under his hand, so that he’s facing him, his eyes searching Kinn’s face with suspicion. His hair is tousled. Kinn brushes it back.
“Talked,” he says. “A preliminary conversation. I’ve scheduled a proper meeting.” He runs his hand through Porsche’s hair, and Porsche pushes his head into his hand, like a cat.
“You were being a dick,” Porsche says. “I don’t like it.”
“I know. But you did lie to me.”
Porsche makes a face. “Mmm. I said sorry.” He catches Kinn’s arm, and kisses the soft skin on its underside; Kinn shivers.
“My father doesn’t want to be bothered with household matters,” he says. “I have access to all the staff and pay records. I can’t promise anything, but we had a good year. I’ll look at next year’s budgets, see if there’s leeway for some changes. Within reason.”
“Thank you,” Porsche says. He sits up, and pulls Kinn into his arms. Kinn goes willingly, letting Porsche hide his face in Kinn’s shoulder. Every single time, it’s astonishing, how Porsche will hold onto him as though he doesn’t want to have to let Kinn go.
“Do you want to come back up to my room?” Kinn asks, stroking over Porsche’s back.
Porsche half-shrugs. “Pete has a cold. He snores. Maybe.”
Kinn conceals a smile, and then gives up on concealing it, and allows himself to smile at Porsche the way he wants to, grateful that he’s fixed this, at least for now. “Good. Come on, then.”
Three weeks later, Kinn calls in the new staff representatives for the formal announcement, which he scheduled in the most imposing conference room. He watches them file in, in their uniforms, awed and trying not to show it, giving Big and Ken, who are stationed at the doors, nervous glances. Porsche is standing just behind him. He’s perfectly dressed and still as a statue, as he should be.
Game is the last in, and sits at the other end of the table. Kinn gives him a small nod of acknowledgement. He trained as a sushi chef, it turns out. He’s very good with knives. Kinn has a growing respect for him.
When everyone is seated, Kinn clears his throat.
“At your collective request, I have renegotiated some of the terms of your employment with this family,” he announces. He opens the file in front of him for effect, though he doesn’t really need it. “Firstly, there will be a 2% pay rise across all positions, with an additional 1% for staff who have been with us for ten years or more.”
There’s a pleased murmur round the table. Kinn smiles. He bargained Game down from 5%.
“Secondly, we have negotiated a new set of rules for maternity leave, sick leave, and leave in relation to other family responsibilities.” He inclines his head at Jewel, who is a slightly terrifying fifty year old auntie inclined to treat Kinn like one of her delinquent sons, which is probably why Porsche likes her so much.
“Finally, I have established a new training programme. Any of you who wish to earn a substantial bonus by accepting a, mmm, a work placement in another establishment for a period, may apply to be considered.”
This was Porsche’s idea, or maybe Kim’s, since he and Tankhun had insisted on pretending to be helpful in relation to all these plans. Of course, word will eventually spread about this little scheme, and then every family and business in the city will be paranoid that half their staff are reporting to Kinn: he can’t wait. This bit was new to some of the people around the table, they’re whispering about it.
He snaps the file shut, and everyone falls silent again. “And it’s been brought to my attention that there may be several security weaknesses in relation to our garbage collection protocols.” It had turned out that there was a legitimate reason why Porsche had been spending so much of his free time down there. “We will be addressing it, in consultation with staff.”
He half-turns towards Porsche, to make it clear who the “we” is in that sentence. Porsche is staring dutifully into the distance, but there’s a very tiny trace of a smile on his face.
Kinn leans back in his seat, and reaches out for Porsche’s hand. Porsche’s composure breaks: he blinks down at him in confusion.
“And finally, I want to be clear that Porsche is my partner,” Kinn says, lifting his chin and looking round the table. He wonders what it’s costing Big and Ken, to look so poker-faced at this announcement. “You will treat him with the same respect with which I treat him, as a member of my household.”
He smiles up at Porsche, who meets his eyes with something that might be wonder.
“That concludes this meeting,” Kinn says, without taking his eyes off him.
There’s a rumble of sound as people push back their chairs, conversations breaking out, but Kinn isn’t paying any attention to them, because he’s reaching up to pull Porsche down.